DOJ: BIOMET BREACHED DEFERRED PROSECUTION AGREEMENT (Orthopedics This Week)
Read more… Tiger’s Timeline of DOJ versus Orthopedic Companies
When Zimmer Holdings, Inc. purchased Biomet, Inc., Zimmer management was well aware that Biomet was under the cloud of a 2012 deferred prosecution agreement (DPA) with U.S. Justice Department to resolve a foreign corruption investigation (FCPA).
The DPA was extended for successive years as prosecutors continued to investigate Biomet’s conduct.
Now that cloud has gotten darker as prosecutors say Biomet has breached the DPA.
Prosecutors filed a status report in Washington, D.C. on June 6, 2016, alleging the breach. The finding could mean that Zimmer Biomet Holdings, Inc., could face criminal prosecution, though the Justice Department said the company had pledged to cooperate and was in “discussions to resolve this matter which would obviate the need for a trial.”
Biomet entered into the 2012 DPA to settle allegations that it paid bribes to state-employed healthcare providers in Argentina, Brazil and China in order to secure business with hospitals. According to the government, Biomet disguised the alleged bribes in its financial reports as “commissions,” “consulting fees,” “royalties” and “scientific incentives.”
As part of the DPA, Biomet agreed to pay a $17.3 million criminal penalty, along with a $5.4 million civil settlement to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, and to maintain a compliance program to prevent future misconduct.
According to the DOJ filing, Biomet breached the DPA, “based on conduct in Brazil and Mexico that was disclosed by the company in 2014 and based on Biomet’s failure to implement and maintain a compliance program designed to prevent and detect violations of the FCPA and other anti-corruption laws.”
Jeff Binder, the CEO of Biomet at the time of the alleged bribes is no longer with the company.

Buyout news worries some at LDR Holding (Austin Business Journal)
Austin frets proposed Zimmer Biomet takeover of LDR Holdings (MedCityNews)
Zimmer Biomet Holdings Inc.’s history of buying up Austin medical device makers and ultimately shutting down those offices are prompting worries about the same thing happening to LDR Holding Corp., which is in the process of being acquired by Indiana-based Zimmer for about $1 billion.
That’s according to the Austin American-Statesman, which quoted Julie Dye, who used to work for Abbott Spine, a company that was bought in 2008 by Zimmer. In 2013, Zimmer shut down that office in Austin.

Ten years before than, in 2003, Zimmer bought Centerpulse AG, previously known as Sulzer Medica. It shut down Austin operations in 2004.
A Zimmer spokesman told the Statesman that it plans to maintain a presence in Austin this time, and LDR CEO Christophe Lavigne said “Zimmer Biomet plans to complement the spine business headquarters in Broomfield, Colo., by maintaining a significant presence in LDR’s strong technology hub here in Austin.”
Shares of LDR Holding (Nasdaq: LDRH) are up more than 60 percent since the buyout was announced Tuesday, closing at $36.92 Wednesday. The company, which produces spinal implants and technologies for treating spinal disorders, was founded in France in 2000 but moved its corporate headquarters to Austin in 2006 and went public in late 2013. It employed 562 people globally at the end of last year, the company said in a regulatory filing, and about 200 in Austin, the Statesman reported.